George Lucas' Marin land in question

REAL ESTATE

Updated 8:48 pm, Tuesday, October 30, 2012

George Lucas' holdings in Marin County include historic Grady Ranch in San Rafael, just past these cypress trees, which he was blocked from developing.

George Lucas' holdings in Marin County include historic Grady Ranch in San Rafael, just past these cypress trees, which he was blocked from developing.

Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

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George Lucas will be building a 270,000 square foot digital media production compound on Grady Ranch in San Rafael, Calif., on the clear hillside (front left) fronting a 174 house community seen in the background on Friday, March 30, 2012. less

George Lucas will be building a 270,000 square foot digital media production compound on Grady Ranch in San Rafael, Calif., on the clear hillside (front left) fronting a 174 house community seen in the ... more

Photo: Liz Hafalia, The Chronicle

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The Main House at Skywalker Ranch in Marin County. It includes a large library and is intended as a kind of retreat for filmmakers.

The Main House at Skywalker Ranch in Marin County. It includes a large library and is intended as a kind of retreat for filmmakers.

Photo: Lucasfilm

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The Technical Building, which houses Skywalker Sound, at Skywalker Ranch in Marin County.

The Technical Building, which houses Skywalker Sound, at Skywalker Ranch in Marin County.

Photo: Lucasfilm

George Lucas' Marin land in question

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Tuesday's sale of Lucasfilm to Disney raises plenty of questions in the Bay Area, where George Lucas' empire is based.

Disney officials have said that current plans call for leaving the Lucas employees where they are, even though the entertainment giant's headquarters are in Southern California.

Lucasfilm is based in San Francisco's Presidio, where the 850,000-square-foot Letterman Digital Arts Center opened in 2005 and houses the corporate offices, along with Industrial Light and Magic and LucasArts.

The company pays more than $5 million a year to lease the 23-acre complex, which was built on the site of the Army's former Letterman Hospital.

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There are more concerns about the future of the Lucas properties in Marin County, although it's unclear whether the largely rural land Lucas and his company own there is included in the deal.

While Lucasfilm is widely viewed as an exemplary corporate citizen, the filmmaker has been involved in a long-running battle with his neighbors over expanding development of his landholdings in the Lucas Valley.

Lucas owns about 3,400 acres in Marin County, including Skywalker Ranch near Nicasio, which he established in 1980. The ranch is home to Skywalker Sound and Skywalker Properties. The nearby Big Rock Ranch houses Lucasfilm Animation and the George Lucas Educational Foundation.

"He's been a wonderful neighbor," said Marin County Supervisor Susan Adams, whose district includes most of Lucas' holdings. "He's only built on about 5 percent of the land he owns."

But in April, Lucas gave up on his decades-old effort to build a state-of-the-art digital production facility on 52 acres of the historic Grady Ranch in Lucas Valley after neighbors tied up the project in legal battles.

"We have several opportunities to build the production stages in communities that see us as a creative asset, not an evil empire," Lucas said in an April 10 letter to the Marin County community that said he would sell the land for residential development.

Lucas had already announced his plan to retire "and he might not have wanted to spend the time and effort on that battle, even though he probably would have won," said Adams.

But if Disney buys that land, it could renew the fight for the studio, she added, because most of the legal work, including approval from the county planners, already has been done.

Although county officials have no hint of Disney's plans for the Lucas facilities, they know what can't be done.

Deed restrictions, agricultural easements and land-use limits established for Grady Ranch land would block intense development.

"Disney won't be able to come in here and build Disneyland North," Adams said.

Marin County has a history with Disney, which moved its ImageMovers Digital studio into Novato's long-closed Hamilton Air Force Base in 2008.

It wasn't a long relationship. Work on films like "Mars Needs Moms," "The Polar Express" and "Beowulf" was done at the studio, but the facility closed in 2010, putting 450 people out of work.

The sale "puts a much larger economic engine in contact with Marin County," said Robert Eyler, chief economist and interim CEO of the nonprofit Marin Economic Forum. Local officials "just need to work on welcoming Disney back to Marin County and support their growth."

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